The first quarter of the year is usually quiet for solar, but Q1 2021 has instead seen an incredible surge in demand, with China, the USA, and India all expected to set annual installation records. Our forecast suggest we will hit 178 GW, up from 146.5 GW in 2020. Two fundamental ways to gauge the scale of the industry are manufacturing capacity and – at least this year – the supply of raw materials. Specifically, polysilicon remains a harsh limiting factor on the solar industry, especially for the Chinese factories whose exports amount to about 50% of global supply (not counting domestic demand). That’s not so much because the supply of polysilicon was impacted by last year’s accidents; by now…